


Handelmort Mansion

by Laetitia_Laetitii



Series: Aileen Westbrook [3]
Category: Runescape
Genre: Gen, Quest fic, Tribal Totem, World Guardian - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 08:41:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7308034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laetitia_Laetitii/pseuds/Laetitia_Laetitii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set during the Tribal Totem quest. Aspiring adventurer and future World Guardian Aileen Westbrook breaks into the mansion of the feared and mysterious Lord Handelmort to reclaim a stolen icon. It is a tale of intrigue and adventure, ball gowns, secret doors and fruitcake. I took the liberty of making the mansion about three times its in-game size, lengthened the events of the quest in proportion, and shoved in quite a lot of my own inventions.</p><p>Written in June, 2016. The prose is atrocious.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

   When the hands turning around the luminescent face of her pocket-watch at last showed midnight, she deemed it safe to climb out of the box. It had been a torturously long wait, spent curled up in the sawdust, while the air grew ever staler. The last of the workmen — whose conversation and footsteps she had distantly heard from outside — had left hours ago. Now she listened carefully for a few minutes, and hearing not a sound, Aileen pushed up the lid of the delivery crate.

        It had all started weeks before, when one night at the Poison Arrow Bonafido had mentioned that the Handelmort Mansion was to undergo repairs. His Lordship, he had explained, was to clear out to his country house with all his servants and leave a crew of workmen to repaint the manor. The only one staying in the city would be Mr Dobson the gardener who lived in a cottage in the grounds, and was to keep an eye on the estate in his master’s absence.

        “Poor bugger,” Bonafido had concluded empathetically, and downed the rest of his Ranger’s Aid. But Aileen’s mind had already been elsewhere; in another conversation in another bar. It had been a long time since her chat with the stranger at Brimhaven, but she had recalled his bitter words just as well — a story of theft, trickery, and desecration — and a plan had begun to form in her head.

        The most difficult part of reclaiming the Rantuki totem — getting into Handelmort Mansion — had proved relatively simple, thanks to her former employer. Some days ago, when Aileen had stopped at Cromperty’s to buy more essence to craft, the wizard had asked her to drop by the post office and see if his package to the Tower had shipped. When she had casually enquired about the nature of the delivery, he had not been able to resist explaining in thorough detail his newest invention, which according to him, was to revolutionize the entire business of teleportation. Aileen, having listened alertly, had agreed to see to it on her way home. The post office people knew her of the old, and were used to having her ask after his mail.  At the end, it had been a matter of forging an address label.

        The hours in the cramped container had taken their toll, and her legs shook slightly as she climbed out and looked about at her new surroundings. It was the first grand house of its kind Aileen had ever been inside, and as such, her first impression of the mansion was rather disappointing. The crate had been left in what seemed to be a spare room of sorts, one which judging by the smell was seldom given an airing. The curtains on the recessed windows were undrawn, and the pale light of the moon, three nights from full, showed a small but high-ceilinged chamber with a bare parquet floor, its few pieces of furniture hidden under dusty white sheets.

        The workmen would return around six in the morning, and Aileen intended to be out by five. There was no telling how many rooms she would have to go through, or how many locks and bolts would hinder her way, which meant she couldn’t afford to loiter. So, straining her ears and hearing nothing but the beating of her own heart, she tiptoed over to the only door. She stood in front of it for a second, trying to push down all her thoughts of town-guards and gallows, and turned the handle.

        Having half-expected the door to be locked, she almost gave a start when it creaked open unhindered. The hinges let out a tiny squeak as she slipped into the corridor, careful to leave the way open. When she had found what she was looking for, she’d come back for the port-a-pad, and send it on as intended. For all their disagreements over the years, she owed Cromperty that much.

        In the hallway the dormer windows let in just enough light to keep her from risking a candle. She was on the upper of the two floors, and the view from the room had been to the market square, much that knowledge did for her. The totem, an object about two feet tall, could be anywhere, and the only option was to look for it systematically. So she started down the hall, treading now polished oak planks, now rug, now planks again. The doors along one wainscoted wall were all similar, and all opened unlocked to chambers similar to the one she had left. Guest-rooms, neglected under the supervision of a famously unsocial master.

        The sheer size of the house was unnerving, and Aileen felt relieved when the corridor finally came to an end and she found herself on a spacious, well-lit stair landing. In front of her, there was a wide, well-carpeted stairway to the ground floor. Beyond it, a latticework door led to a large balcony overlooking the dark gardens. Directly in front of the stairs stood a pair of identical double doors, side by side. She stopped for a second on the landing, trying to decide on which direction to head, and on a whim, she tested the handle nearest to her. _Clunk._ Locked. After all the freely-swinging doors in the guest wing, what was behind this one that had been deemed worth securing? Would it contain items of Lord Handelmort’s famed collection of art and curiosities, or even the –too early for that. Soundlessly, Aileen slid from her pocket a set of lock-picks. It was not an object that she was proud of possessing, but it was one that had served her well more than once. She inserted the torque wrench in the hole, and rotating it gently, felt for the pins inside with a pick. If she had worried, there was hardly need for it. As any decent burglar could have told her, a bedroom lock is usually a cosmetic affair, designed to keep out unwanted servants rather than thieves, and this one proved to be no exception. A few pushes, a tiny click, and the door gave way.

        The smell hit her immediately. It was the same unaired mustiness as in the previous rooms but magnified tenfold, as if the windows had not been opened in years. Underneath lingered another scent — perfume and powder, old rose petals and soap, all slightly decayed. On the bay window there were two sets of curtains, one of thin gauze, one of heavy velvet, but both had been left open, and she could see about with ease. Compared to the others, the room was enormous, and under the ubiquitous white sheets, the outlines of its furniture were grander. Near the window, there was a canopied double bed with a vanity dresser beside it. By the fireplace, under the watchful eye of dusty china shepherdesses, two easy chairs kept company to a table. Behind a carved screen, a bathroom door had been left ajar.

        As she walked across the soft Kharidian rug, Aileen recalled what Cromperty had told her a long time ago — that as a young man, Lord Handelmort had been briefly married to the daughter of an Asgarnian viscount. She had taken ill only few years into the marriage, and had spent the remainder of her short life as a bedridden invalid, never seen by anyone save for His Lordship, her chambermaid and a string of doctors, all of whom had been sworn to silence. After her death, the rumour that her husband had poisoned her had never quite gone away.

        This was only one of such stories told about Lord Handelmort, who occupied a position as a kind of living bogeyman in the folklore of Ardougne. Malicious reports and weird tales were circulated about him at inns and taverns of the city, most of which could be neither proved nor disproved.  It was said that much of his estate had been obtained through unspecified legal trickery, and that he had paupered several (always unnamed) cousins in the process. Others swore that he not only had acquaintances among Zamorakian monks and chaos druids, but that he participated in blasphemous midnight rituals at the Ourania altar. Yet more claimed as a fact that he sold weapons and runestones to General Khazard.

        Poison or no poison, Aileen had no doubt that the chamber she was standing in was the late Lady Handelmort’s bedroom. When the thought occurred to her that the Lady had in all likelihood died in it, a sudden, twisted fancy seized her, and she had to ascertain herself of its falsehood. Striding over to the canopied bed, she tore aside the curtain to reveal — pillows. Little embroidered cushions with tassels on the corners, such as a woman reclining in bed all day might lean her elbow on.  A counterpane of floral silk, topped by a yellowed kyatt rug. No corpse. Definitely no corpse. The thought, Aileen knew, had been entirely irrational, and had been born of equal parts sheer nervousness and the gossip surrounding the mansion’s owner. Nevertheless, she knew just as well that once it had formed in her head, she could not have left the bed unchecked.

        Apart from the removal of the deceased, everything else seemed to have been kept as it had been in her life. On the cherrywood vanity lay a comb and a hairbrush, complemented by a handmirror of the same engraved silver. Next to them sat a crystal perfume-vial, nearly full. No-one had emptied from the windowsill the porcelain bowl of pot-pourri, long devoid of any fragrance, or replaced in a shelf the calf-bound book with a mark halfway through the pages. Time had been stopped in the room, and nothing but dustings disturbed its sepulchral peace.

        In the far corner Aileen pulled the covering off an enormous, ancient wardrobe. By now, she had temporarily abandoned interest in her mission, and was moved solely by curiosity. (No matter what people said about him, she did not think for a second that His Lordship would keep a Karamjan pagan totem in his dead wife’s closet.) She studied the carved double-doors (ivy, doves, climbing-roses) for a spell, before flinging them open to see what was inside.

        Bathed in moonlight, omitting a slight odour of cedar-oil and mothballs, hung Lady Handelmort’s dresses. Rose silk, black velvet, floral muslin, gold brocade. There were morning dresses and ball gowns and travel cloaks; all slightly old-fashioned in their cut, but made with such skill that they looked quaint and charming rather than clumsy. Puffed sleeves and wide skirts, bodices and trains, every one decorated with enough lace and ribbons to deck out an army of brides.

        If asked, Aileen would have said she did not care how she dressed. In reality, she had never been able to afford nice clothes, and in any case she would have had nowhere to wear them. Now, faced with this treasure trove, an old jealousy rose within her, and she couldn’t tell whether she wanted to steal the lot or rip it to shreds. Her hands shook slightly as she went through them, pushing dress after dress aside. Finally, she pulled out the one she liked best, something off-the-shoulder in midnight blue, and walked over to the tall mirror. She held the gown against her body, as if trying it for size, and studied the effect appraisingly — the way the silk shifted colour as it moved, the way the crystals on the bodice caught light, and her own thin, severe face above it. She could have taken it, but showing it off in public would have meant she’d have to explain its origin. She could have altered it beyond recognition, and face questions about how she had afforded the fabric. And then she’d still have no occasion to wear it. Then she walked back to the wardrobe, replaced the dress, and having arranged everything as it had been, left the room and let the lock click shut behind her.

        As it stood to reason that a gentleman who collected curiosities might want to display them to his callers (even if they were as few as Lord Handelmort’s), Aileen decided to forego the other bedrooms and head directly to the ground floor. Growing alert again; stopping to listen every few steps, she descended the curving staircase to the mansion’s entrance hall. After the faded, feminine intimacy of Lady Handelmort’s chamber, the great foyer felt uneasily vast and bleak. It was as if the architect had designed it to cause perturbed awe in whoever entered it, with nothing to soften the effect of the black-and-white marble tiling, the endless rows of unwelcoming closed doors, and sheer draughty, echoing space. It made her feel small and bare, and instinctively she clung to the walls, avoiding the open like a wild animal.

        Instead, she circled behind the stairs, where she found small doors camouflaged in the walnut panelling. They were hidden passages for hidden people, unseen by those who lived in the great halls. And when Aileen went through the first one, she stepped into another world. It was the parallel universe that exists in any house where dozens of fires in dozens of rooms are always in want of stoking, where mile after mile of corridors need their daily sweeping, or where grand banquets are served to people who neither cook nor wash dishes. It was a world much closer to the one she had been born in, and she had stumbled right into the part of it where she felt at home the best. In other words, Aileen had found a kitchen.

        It was a grand, cavernous space to which the flagstone floor and the bare ceiling beams gave the air of a cottage. Stoves and sinks, work-tables and cupboards lined the perimeter, while in one corner a fireplace large enough for a man to stand in had been demoted to a storage closet, and now held a collection of washing vats and cauldrons. Before the whole household had left for the countryside, the kitchen servants had been more diligent than the chamber maids: Every ash-grate had been emptied, and a neat starting-fire had been built in every stove. The floor had been swept clean of the smallest crumbs, and mouse-traps had been laid at every corner. Forgetting her purpose once more, Aileen wandered around, peeking behind doors to find first a laundry room (vats, a mangle), then a scullery (pumps, drains, a faint odour of mildew) and finally, a pantry.

        It was hours since she had eaten, and looking about in what had to be only one of the mansion’s store-rooms made her feel every minute of them. The shelves were crammed with jams and jellies, pickles and preserves, all in neatly labelled glass jars. In clay containers there were spices she knew cost a fortune, and spices she had never heard of. Air-dried hams that could have fed a family for a month hung drying from the rafters, together with sausages as thick as her upper arm, braids of dried garlic and bunches of fragrant herbs. Perishables, of course, had been cleared out, but in the flurry of scrubbing and scouring that had preceded the servants’ departure, one item turned out to have been forgotten. It was half a fruitcake, which Aileen discovered under a tea towel between dwellberry jam and whatever was draconic marmalade.

        It was a serious affair as far as bakery goods go, sticky with sugar and saturated with enough brandy to knock out a mountain troll. Furthermore, as it had been kept from mice by the dainty stand and from flies by the towel, it proved to be in blameless condition. Aileen, who figured that people who could afford to forget about half a fruitcake would not miss another slice, flicked out her pocket-knife and carved herself a chunk.  And thus, nibbling on Karamjan pineapple and liquor-soaked raisins, she carried on with her quest.

        In the hall, she now went through the doors systematically, one by one. The first one lead to a dining room, where some two dozen chairs stood vigil to a table the size of a small ship. Discounting the pastoral scenes painted on the panels and the tulle-bound chandelier, there were no decorations, nowhere to hide what she looked for.

        The second one was what a better class of people call a drawing room. In the absence of any ladies who would withdraw there after dinner it had been left draped sheets, and cursory glances under them revealed nothing more interesting than a stuffed dragon’s head and a glass cabinet holding an assortment of runestones.

        The third was the library. It was a small, comfortable room with mahogany bookcases lining each wall, every inch of their shelves full. There were huge tomes in hard leather covers and slim volumes bound in painted silk, old books and new books, more than she had ever imagined one person could own. She ran a hand across their backs, reading titles in Common, and others in the Ancient Tongue and Kharidian, and others what she thought might have been Elvish. If leaving Cromperty’s service had one downside (besides the loss of housing and regular income) it had been forfeiting access to the wizard’s private library. Aileen could hardly afford to buy books, and while the new circle of friends she had cultivated since her departure was certainly interesting, few of its members were literate. In consequence, she had had precious little to read for the past months, and the selection around her was like a banquet for the starving.

        Resisting the urge to stop to inspect the titles (Old Gnomish, High Menaphitic) she walked along the wall to the enormous marble fireplace. Over it, on the only patch of bare masonry in the room, hung the Handelmort coat of arms. Under the shield stood guard a pair of oil paintings, portraits of two men with the same sharp features and stern expressions. Their clothes placed them in the past, perhaps a generation apart, and it took little imagination to see them as father and son, the previous masters of the house. On the mantelpiece beneath was a single object, a vicious, curved scimitar made of crimson metal. Both the sword’s design and material were uncannily outlandish, and Aileen had no doubt that it was one of Lord Handelmort’s famed souvenirs.

        These were another source of infinite curiosity to the townspeople. His Lordship was known to travel to far-flung places all over the world, never with a proper retinue as a gentleman should, but alone and in secrecy. After an absence of weeks or months, during which he’d send no letters save for missives concerning the running of his estate, he’d return in abhorrent condition; sunburnt, stick-thin, ravished by exotic disease, but quietly triumphant. Once recovered, he’d invite over a choice friend or two, and show his latest acquisition to them, but never to Ardougne’s broader society.

        Given how much gossip made of his trophies, Aileen was perplexed by how little of them she had seen. None of the paintings and vases had looked particularly unusual, and by now she had been through all the most public parts of the house. If not in the dining or drawing rooms or the foyer, where did the man keep his private museum? She checked her watch, and seeing there were still three hours to go, decided she could linger in the library a little bit longer. She drew from the shelf a tiny volume with embroidered covers, but got hold of herself before she could open it and be enchanted by the words within until dawn. She put the book back, and dropped her eyes to stare into the empty grate. Then Aileen did a bit of imagining. She would light the fire, and let it warm up the room. She’d fetch from upstairs one of Her Ladyship’s shawls, and from the kitchen the ingredients for tea — a slice of cake, a jar of jam. Then she would pick a book, any book she liked, and read it in one of the soft leather arm chairs by the hearth, warm drink in hand, toes buried in the larupia rug.

        Had Aileen not spent so long standing still, she would have hardly noticed the draught. But it blew right in her motionless face, a breeze of cool air whence no cool air should have issued. It came from a crack between two bookcases, which by logic ought to have had their backs to solid stone wall. Abandoning her daydream, she began to look around for anything else amiss, and soon spotted what she had half-anticipated: A sturdy-looking tome on an eye-level shelf, protruding by an inch from the row of neatly aligned backs. Upon closer inspection, she saw the title had worn away, as if by repeated touch.  Tentatively, a suspicion forming on her mind, she reached for the book, and after a second’s hesitation, pushed it flush with the others. _Click._ When Aileen stepped back, she saw that the bookcase was slightly askew. Taking hold of the side, she pulled at it, until slowly, laboriously, the secret door swung open to reveal the place the cool air came from.

        Until now, she had been able to rely on the moon. It was just as well, for even if the wide gardens and tall hedges meant that there was little risk of being seen, it would only take one night owl spotting an unexpected glow in the window, and the town patrol would soon be all over the place. But staring into the pitch blackness ahead Aileen knew she had no other option than to hazard a light. So she crouched down, and fished from her tunic pocket another one of her burglar’s tools, a small dark lantern. After a minute’s fumbling with waxed matches, the candle burnt brightly, and she proceeded to the next room.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> See chapter one for summary.

         It was Lord Handelmort’s study. It was also, as much was plain to see, the home of his private collection. The artefacts, the treasures; the statues and paintings, carvings and weapons, jewels and textiles, covered almost every square foot of the room. They were on pedestals and stands, in cabinets and display cases, or simply strewn over whatever surfaces were available, be it floor or windowsill. Curtains of black velvet shielded the windows, and in the flickering light of the lantern the room became the underground temple of a forgotten pagan god, filled with priceless tributes and the intoxicating smell of cedar and incense.

        Doing the office of an altar was a massive writing desk made of shimmering, bluish wood, on which had been left a large map of Gielinor. Little pins with glass heads had been stuck here and there on it, with tiny notes scribbled beside them in pencil. At the edge of the map rested a sextant holding down a scrap of paper containing what looked like coordinates. Aileen, who had never learned about longitudes and latitudes couldn’t make much of them, and so she moved to inspecting the objects on display.

        If there was a logic according to which the items was organised, she could not make it out. They were not arranged according to size, or type, or place of origin. In one glass-fronted cabinet, she could see an assortment of cast gold artefacts (a seal, a brooch shaped like a beetle, an animal statuette) and a pair of crystal blades accompanied by a small parchment label  _arma Iorverthum._ In the one next to it were stored a shield and a necklace, both of inhuman size and fashioned from darkly gleaming stone. In contrast to these, many of the other articles hardly looked valuable. What made special the hollow-eyed black mask, from which a little wooden amulet dangled on a leather string? Who would travel to the ends of earth for the bronze plateskirt and brassard, broken and ravaged by verdigris? And why did so many of them look somehow sinister? What for had he wanted the cylindrical stone pillar with stylized, apish features worked on its surface, and where had it lain hidden to be covered in such monstrous barnacles? But there was nothing to guide her, no-one to ask, and so she moved silently from wonder to wonder, growing less and less easy every minute.

        In front of one of the curtained windows was a lectern, and on the lectern lay a book. It was an ancient leather-bound thing with no title on either the cover or the back. Instead, on the front was emblazoned an angular pictogram, one that Aileen had seen scrawled on ruins ransacked by goblins. Inside (she could not resist flicking it open) the pages were thick parchment, damaged by damp and filled with painstakingly lettered words in broken Common:

          _“Then Big High War God go to demons and ask, Will you fight in my army? But demons say, No, we fight for God of Dark Fire.”_ But before she could get any further, a racket broke out right outside the window. A dog! A dog, one of Handelmort’s bloodhounds, was barking its head off not five feet from where she was standing. It didn’t matter whether it had hear her move or if a beam of light had escaped through an unseen crack, she had been spotted. Without wasting a second, she closed the lid on the lantern. Now another joined in on the chorus, and both were baying loud enough to wake up the whole of East Ardougne.

        Then, when Aileen had frozen still right outside the window, not daring to move a muscle, the worst happened. Somewhere, not too far away, a door slammed shut, and man’s voice called:

 _“Ripper! Delrith! What’s with the ruckus?”_ It was Dobson; Mr Dobson the Gardener, who had been left in the city to keep watch over the house. The dogs had awoken him, and Aileen could hear his footsteps on the gravel path.  _“What’s with the noise? What is it? What is it, boy?”_ His voice was calming, but the dogs would not quiet down. He said a few words Aileen could not decipher, and then started to walk away. With the crunching gravel and the dogs following, it was easy to see where he was headed. He was going north along the west wall, and was plainly, clearly bound for the kitchen door.

        As the realisation hit her, Aileen’s mind began to race. She had left no tracks on the still-clean floor, but had she been careless in any other way? Somewhere in the distance, the kitchen door open and shut. The hounds, thank goodness, were left outside. Had she moved anything? Would he check the pantry? She could hear a door creak, and then to her horror, another. He was going through the rooms, in the same order as Aileen had, less than an hour ago. Door. Steps in the dining room. Door again. Steps in the entrance hall. Door — the drawing room, he was coming right to her! She had closed the way to the foyer, but the secret passage was open. Steps towards the library. Quickly, quickly, she raced over to the bookcase. It was a heavy drag, weighed down by the volumes on the shelves, but she pulled it inch by inch. Dobson was now right outside, and was fumbling with the handle. One more, one more   — a drag, a jingling sound, and simultaneously, two locks clicked, and Dobson was in the library.

        Panting, heart racing in her throat, she waited in the dark. On the other side, the gardener walked over to the window, then to the fireplace (did he know about the study?) and then stood still for a minute. At last, when she was certain he was going to come to the bookcase, she heard him mutter under his breath, and then the door swung open and shut again. Fading footsteps, the kitchen door, and he was gone. Feeling lightheaded, Aileen sunk on the floor, her back against the wall. She sat there for a while, breathing in short hitches, and let the cold sweat dry on her forehead. The danger appeared to be over, and so she flipped the lid on her lantern open, and looking at nothing in particular, her eyes wandered to a cabinet in the corner. It was a tall, narrow case made of teak, with meandering figures inlaid in mother-of-pearl along the corners. Inside it, on a plaster podium, was the Rantuki totem.

        Kangai had described the icon in minute detail, and she had no doubt as to its identity. He had spoken of its carved wings (angular, bat-like), of the fierce face set in gold (on which the light of her lantern glittered), of the symbols carved around the base (The very same ones he had scrawled on a napkin.) Not trusting her legs yet, Aileen crawled over to the cabinet, and inspected the artefact. It was what she had come for, and now the only thing left to do was to get it out of the house.

        She gathered herself for a moment, and went for the handle. To her surprise, it turned without resistance or sound, and seconds later the totem was in her hands. It was heavy, heavier than she had expected, and up close she could only marvel at the craftsmanship, the flowing grain pattern of the red wood, the amber eyes. Unwilling to waste any more time, Aileen took off her backpack, and removed from it an old shawl she had brought for this purpose. Once the icon was wrapped up tightly, and no part of it could be seen, she packed the bundle in on top of a change of clothes, and headed for the secret door.

        There was only one problem: on the spot where she had entered there was nothing but an expanse of smooth, panelled wall, with neither handle nor keyhole in sight. Hurrying to close the door, she had neglected to consider the other half of the equation — how to get it open again. Pushing yielded no result. She ran her fingers down the facet cuts of the panelling, looking for a hidden mechanism, and found nothing but solid timber. Forcing down the rising panic, she stepped back, and coerced herself to think rationally. Ourania had taught her that. Hiding in the nooks and crevices of the cave, breathing sulphuric fumes while she waited for the Zamorakian monks to leave, she had learned to stay calm and logical when certain death was one ill-timed move away. This was no different.

        There had to be a way out. That Lord Handelmort’s study would have an entrance, but no exit but the window, did not make the faintest sense. It also stood to reason that the way out was the same as the way in, and that opening the door was a simple matter of discovering the mechanism. On the library’s side, the lock was operated with a fake book. On this side, wouldn’t the trigger be hidden as well? So she went along the wall slowly, inspecting the woodwork, looking for uneven tiles underfoot. None of the surrounding furniture was affixed to the floor, nor did the carpet hide any buttons or levers. There was nothing on the wall, save for oak panels …and a pair of oil lamps in wrought-iron holders. And the holder on the right-hand side, the hinge-side, was ever so slightly askew. She reached for it, and somehow knowing what to do, pulled the lever down, until she heard a tiny click, and the tiniest, moonlit sliver of light appeared in the wall.

        It was unbelievably relieving to be out of the tiny room and its stifling smell of incense. As Aileen pressed shut the bookcase once more, she felt oddly serene, as if the most dangerous part of getting out of the house wasn’t still ahead. But as she had pushed the heavy door open, an idea had started to form in the back of her head, and when she slipped out into the corridor, its last pieces slid in place. First things first, she extinguished her lantern and pocketed it. Next, she headed up the staircase, and up to the first floor. Outside the moon was setting, and the city slept in the darkness. Far, far away, lights burned in the northern gate. Then it was back along her own tracks, down the familiar hallway with the doors on one side, until she found the one that was ajar.  In the corner, she dug from its bed of sawdust the port-a-pad, and with little difficulty, fitted it inside her backpack with the totem. It was in this room that she had started out, two and half hours ago by her watch. She breathed for a minute, and then started for the ground floor for the final time.

        In the foyer, she found the kitchen door, and headed straight for the pantry. Once safely inside she lit her lantern again, flicked out her knife, and set to work. First, she took from its hanging-nail one of the monstrous hams. Then she proceeded to cut off chunks off its side, four, five, six, and stored them in one pocket. Before leaving —as an afterthought laced by not a small trace of class resentment — she shoved in her pack the rest of the fruitcake, towel and all, together with two jars of marmalade, one labelled “draconic”, the other “Zamorak.”

        What came next required good timing, steady nerves, and not a little bit of luck.  The main entrance was out of the question. The kitchen door was in the north-west corner of the house, while the gardener’s cottage was in the north-west corner of the garden. That left Aileen the windows. So far, she had stuck to the western half of the ground floor. Now she headed to the east, and found there unlocked the entrance to what she guessed was called a music-room, a small chamber home to little more than a grand piano and a few comfy chairs. Did Lord Handelmort play? It was somehow easy to imagine he did, alone and unobserved, the same way it was easy to imagine so many things of the mysterious nobleman she had heard so much about, but never seen. Nevertheless, here was the window, with its view of the flowerbeds and manicured lawns. Aileen looked around for a while, and seeing no dogs, she worked open the latch, and pushed one side open. Then she left the room, and headed to the library.

        The hounds, though calm now, had never left the west wall. They still paced the along the side of the house, hungry and restless, and for a bit Aileen was afraid she would not be able to open the window before the baying started.  But she did, and when the first bark rang out, she was ready with a slice of ham, which was sent flying through the air to land on the grass. Straight away, the animal headed for it. The next piece went out before the first one was finished. The third followed soon, and invited the second dog over. Two more rashers for them to fight over, and she pulled close the window to run for the music room.

        Flying high on the adrenaline, the baying ringing in her ears, Aileen slipped out of the window and landed among the well-mulched lilies. Now, the gate or the hedge? Risk of exposure or risk of being delayed? Far on the other side, the door of the gardener’s cottage slammed shut again, and this time she could hear furious swearing:  _“Can’t a man catch an hour of sleep — “_ And then all her concerns about choosing a way of exiting were taken out of her hands, because the third dog had shown up.

        It had been quite unaware of her presence, and when she appeared right in front of it, both the human and the animal froze still for a few seconds. Then the growling began, and she could see the creature brace to pounce.

 _“Easy, easy, now, easy now,”_ she repeated in low voice. Far away, the other dogs and their tired keeper continued their racket unheeded. Slowly as in a dream, she pulled from her pocket the last chunk of air-dried ham, and held it in front of her.  _“See?”_ She murmured,  _“See what I’ve got for a good boy?”_ And before another second passed, she flung the meat at the dog and ran for the hedge like the blazes.

        There is an art to half-climbing, half-pushing through a trimmed topiary hedge, but it can be achieved by someone determined enough — say, by a fit, agile young woman who is deadly afraid of firstly a hungry bloodhound, and secondly, being found guilty of breaking and entering a Lord’s manor in a city that employs both the stocks and the death penalty. And thus Aileen touched ground, bloodied and scratched but free, in the lane behind the houses surrounding Ardougne Market.

        For a moment she was disoriented. Then, though she wanted nothing as much as to collapse on the ground and be sick, she began to limp northwards, following the perimeter of the square. It would not do to be seen in front of the mansion while there was a risk of either Dobson or the town guard being around, and so she took the long route to her next stop. At this time, a bit past three o’clock by her watch, the streets were deserted. And as she walked along the empty lanes, now east, now south, saluting Cromperty’s dark windows as she turned a corner, the shock turned to euphoria, and she felt as if she was walking on clouds. The night was cool and sweet, the moon nearly gone, and as the sea wind filled her dust-choked lungs with fresh air, Aileen began to contemplate on her new status. She was now a criminal. A burglar. A thief.  She could easily be hung for what she had done. Would it show on her?  Would something in her countenance, the way she looked or walked, give it away? If it did, she would soon know.

        Even at this hour, the harbour was not asleep. Drunken sailors, and all the criminals and hangarounds who wished to either buy or sell something to them, crowded the piers, and none paid too much attention to woman carrying a heavy rucksack. She stopped once on the way, to confirm with an idle deckhand that the liner bound for Brimhaven would leave at six.

        At the Poison Arrow Pub, which stands by the docks — and which thus is the first drinking establishment a parched seaman sees when he first lands on shore in Ardougne — the usual suspects lounged at their tables while the woman known as Maid Marion polished glasses behind the bar. She greeted the rune-runner by name, and asked no questions about either her scratched face or the ordered bottle of rum. Not asking questions was a house policy with Maid Marion.

        It wasn’t a bad crowd for three in the morning, and no-one bothered Aileen as she made her way to the table by the back door.

        “Bonafido,” she greeted, pulling up a chair. “Leo. Larry. Geoff.”

        “Aileen,” What are you doin’ ‘ere this time of the night?”

        “I’m leaving, Bonafido,” she said. “I’m going away for a bit, and I thought we might as well celebrate.” And hearing no opposition, she dealt out the glasses, and broke the seal on the Karamjan.

        “Where are you going, then?”

        “Brimhaven, Jimmy Dee. I’m going to Brimhaven.” She poured the glasses to the brim, knowing well she had money for another bottle.

        “Brimmy? That’s the ticket. Cheers.”

        “Cheers. Only Jimmy, Fido, I was here the whole night tonight.”

        “What do you mean you — of course you been ‘ere, lass. Cheers!”

        “Cheers. Don’t mention it.”

        “Leen, you damn nigh live in this bloody watering hole. Cheers!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The text in the book Aileen reads is from the Goblin Book, also known as The Book of the Big High War God, and belongs to Jagex.
> 
> Kudos to anyone who can identify all the objects in the paragraph beginning "If there was a logic..."


End file.
